Main Page
(Choose your language / Wähle die gewünschte Sprache)
Consulchess at the Chess Olympiad!
From September 11 to 22, the 45.Chess Olympiad takes place in Budapest - and consulchess is included! We have a small presentation stand in the "BOK Hall", near the playing venue for the Chess Olympiad, right next to Judit Polgar's "Chess Palace".If you're there, stop by!
On September 17, starting at 5 p.m., there is even a small consulchess tournament taking place in the playing area for amateurs (BOK Hall "C"). There are a few small prizes, entry is free!
Consulchess
Dear chess friends!
What is Consulchess all about?
Consulchess is a relatively new chess variation. Compared to classical Chess there are three important changes:
- a greater board - instead of 8x8 squares we have a bigger 8x10 chessboard at Consulchess
- a new piece - the "consul", which moves similar to the queen, but includes this with jumping possibilities, and
- a "free" castling - there are now not only the usual two (long/short), but no less than 47(!) different possibilities to castle
The detailed rules are described in "The rules of Consulchess” section below.
Consulchess is a very successful extension of traditional chess. It's really great fun to play! It is by now particularly popular (especially among younger chess players) in Hungary, the home country of the inventor Tibor Nagy. Consulchess is even enjoyed by Hungarian grandmasters such as Horváth József, his brother Horváth Csaba, Medvegy Zoltán and Seres Lajos. In Germany you can always find an opponent at the chess section of the Betriebssportgemeinschaft (BSG) Jülich on their friday game evenings.
Consulchess was patented under the name "German/Hungarian chess" at German Patent and Trademark Office and is therefore also protected by copyright.
The rules of Consulchess
The rules of traditional chess are basically retained, with the exception of following changes/extensions:
The (greater) chessboard and the initial position
The new, larger chessboard consists of 80 squares (8 rows - designated from 1 to 8; and 10 lines - designated from a to j). There are now a total of 40 pieces on the board, 20 white and 20 black. As in traditionell chess, the 10 pawns of one color are now next to each other on row 2 (white) and row 7 (black). There are 10 pieces on the two basic rows, with 2 new consuls being added. The basic setup of the pieces (from outside to inside) is set up as follows: rook | knight | bishop | consul. Queen and king are being positioned stand on the two center lines e and f.
The mnemonic "White Queen, White Field" does not apply to Consulchess. Instead, in Consulchess we say: "The king is placed on his color" (i.e. white king f1 / black king f8). As always in chess, all types of pieces are exactly opposite each other.
The Consul
The consul is the eponymous new piece in Consulchess. At the beginning, two consuls are placed on lines d and g, thus taking king and queen into their midst. The consul's moves are similar to those of the queen: like the queen, he moves vertically, horizontally and diagonally. However, there is one limitation and one extension of this, compared to the queen:
- Restriction: the consul has a shorter stride than the Queen and can only be moved one, two or a maximum of three squares in one turn according to the direction in which it moves. Thus, he is a kind of “limited-range queen.” But the following extension has it all:
- Extension: In addition, the consul may jump/move over one or two squares occupied immediately next to him within the limits of his permitted movement directions and in doing so also hit an opponent's stone on his end square. The stones skipped may be either of your or your opponent's color; empty fields may not be skipped. Across occupied squares, the consul can also put the enemy king in check or (with the help of other pieces) checkmate. To clarify, it should be mentioned here that the opponent's stones that have been jumped over may not be captured by jumping over them.
This makes the consul an extremely interesting chess piece who brings some special dynamic into play. He is particularly dangerous as an attacker, as his checks sometimes cannot be prevented by placing something in between. Not least because of this, the probability of a draw at consul chess is significantly lower.
(Examples how to move the consul to follow)
When writing down the moves in algebraic notation, the consul is abbreviated with a "C". Alternatively, the abbreviations "Co" or "Ko" with two letters are also permitted, in order to avoid confusion with, for example, C = Cavalier (French for bishop).
Free Castling
In Consulchess, there are not only 2, but a maximum of 47 castling options for each player, compared to traditional chess. Here, the king and one of the rooks on the back row jump over each other, as is common in classic chess, but the final position after jumping over is freely selectable and not fixed. However, when castling, the king is not allowed to jump to a corner square. Both king and rook have to move at least one square towards each other.
Otherwise, the usual rules of chess apply to castling: no castling out of a check, into a check or with the king over a square threatened by the opponent; and both the king and the rook being castled with must not have moved before in the game.
It is advisable to announce castling before or when the king is touched. This is especially true when the king only moves one square towards his rook when castling, in order to eliminate the risk of confusion with a pure kings move.
Free castling brings completely new strategic and tactical moments into the game and can be used variably and often unexpectedly as a defense and/or attack move.
Link: list of all 47 castling possibilities
Consulchess 42k
News
On February 10, 2024, a major consul rapid chess tournament took place in Budapest for the third time with a prize fund of €1,000!
A total of 38 participants, including 6 FIDE-titled players, came together in Budapest on February 10, 2024 for a major consulchess tournament. Six rounds were played with a thinking time of 10 minutes + 5 seconds per move. The only grandmaster in the field, GM Zoltán Medvegy (see picture on the right), was considered the Elo favorite, but suffered two draws during the tournament, including one against the tournament winner FM Levente Miszler.
Of the 112 games played, only eight ended in a draw, which equals a draw rate of 7.14%. This low drawing rate is typical for consulchess; Drawing artists have little chance and will often fall by the wayside.
All results can be found at chess-results.com:
Link to the Chess-Results-Server chess-results.com
And here you will find the results of Consulchess-Tournaments from the previous years:
Link to the tournament held on 01-21-2023 (54 participants)
Link to the tournament held on 05-08-2022 (43 participants)
Social Media
Please also visit our YouTube channel! You can currently find the following videos there: